When Larry Met Seiji
by Monkey 2 Electric Boogaloo
Summary: Akira Kijima, Seiji Amanome & Kaoru Hazuki from the Spirit Hunter:NG game travel to a Pacific island where they meet DRV3's Angie Yonaga and Seiji concocts an idea for earning some fast money from a couple of scandal-hit British royals who now live there. A follow-up to my previous fic "Wedding Crashers"


**WHEN LARRY MET SEIJI**

The big sign hanging over the airport concourse read "Welcome To Aloaroamatoa – Where God Drinks Our Blood!" Akira Kijima paused for a second, to take it all in.

"I think we've come to the right place, guys," he announced to his travelling companions.

"Oh, wow!" said Kaoru Hazuki.

"Ah, crap!" muttered Seiji Amanome. "Yeah, you were right, Akira. These guys are _exactly_ as nutty as you said they would be. Of course, the slogan's probably meant to get the attention of tourists."

"Yeah, and it's obviously worked so well," said Akira, gesturing at the concourse. It was almost wholly devoid of people. It _was _wholly devoid of people who didn't look native to a small Pacific island. Here and there in the emptiness stood several trolleys piled high with crates labelled "Blood of Aloaroamatoa Whisky." "It must be a slogan for the local distillery."

Amanome shrugged. "I suppose it can't be helped. I mean, we needed somewhere out of the way to lay low for a while. You can't say this doesn't fit the bill."

Amanome's dad and some of his yakuza friends had started taking an interest in the underground fighting scene, specifically in a scheme that Akira should make sure he lost his next championship fight, in which the odds were very much in his favour. Akira felt this was against his honour as a fighter and a man and, on the day, had found he just couldn't go through with it. His opponent was OK after a short spell in hospital though, so it wasn't all bad.

It had been an awkward situation for the two. Even if Amanome was the boss's son, with all the money lost, apologies just weren't enough. They had been told in no uncertain terms that they should both make themselves about as scarce as possible until they were able to come up with a refund for the aggrieved gamblers.

"That's OK for you two," said Kaoru. "But this is my summer holiday! Idols don't get much time off, you know. I had to really turn the screws on my management to even get a week. You promised me a tropical vacation!"

"Well, it _is_ tropical," replied Akira. "And besides, if these people really do offer human sacrifices to their god, can you imagine the number of spirits there must be on this island? There'll be plenty to keep you busy."

"Oh my God, you're right!" said Kaoru, her face lighting up. Amanome's dropped like a stone at the prospect of more ghost-related shenanigans. All that business last summer had been quite enough for him.

"Hey, Kaoru, that's great for you, but I want to make it clear up front – I'm not getting involved in any more ghostbusting. It does _not _make me feel good. Besides, Akira and I have serious business matters to deal with."

"Yeah, like making sure our legs don't get broken the minute we get back to Tokyo," added Akira.

As they were talking, they walked across the concourse and reached an area in front of the terminal exit where a number of dusty, rather sad-looking booths were standing – duty-free stalls, currency exchanges, retailers of miscellaneous tourist tat and so on. None of them looked as if they saw much use. Some weren't even manned.

Behind one which was, though, sat a girl about their own age, brown-skinned and with long white hair. She wore a long yellow smock over what looked like a white bikini, and as soon as she saw them, she jumped to her feet with a gleam in her grey eyes.

"Oh me, oh my!" she declared. "Praise Atua, some tourists at last! Welcome to Aloaroamatoa, jewel of the South Pacific, lady and gentlemen! This is Yonaga's Souvenir Stall, run by me, Angie! Please feel free to look over my wide range of exquisite handcrafted gifts and ask me about the many bargains on offer!"

Akira halted, casting a sceptical eye over the conch shells, wooden tiki sculptures with "Made in China" in kanji on the labels and eye-searingly bright coloured shorts randomly heaped up on the table in front of Angie. He noticed a T-shirt with three wolves howling at the moon on the front hanging behind her, and a lot of knock-off Minions merchandise. Inside, Akira died a little.

"Sorry, Miss, we, ah, haven't changed our money yet," he said.

"No problem!" replied Angie, producing, apparently from nowhere, a large cashbox. "Yonaga's Souvenir Stall will accept payments in a range of currencies, including pounds sterling, yen, euros, giant flat stones with holes through the middle and, of course, the Yankee dollar!" She smiled dazzlingly.

Amanome sighed. "Akira, you know we're going to end up buying something."

"And I have something I want to buy!" chimed in Kaoru, excitedly. She pointed to one of the T-shirts hanging behind Angie. It was black and bore, in silver (and English), the slogan "Maui Wowie!" Akira didn't know what that meant but knew in his bones it would be something really stupid.

"I need more appropriate holiday clothing!" went on Kaoru, who had insisted on wearing full Gothic Lolita regalia on the trip out, in spite of the fact that they would be effectively walking into a sauna as soon as they left air conditioning behind. Akira shrugged; it was Kaoru's money, after all.

As Kaoru checked that the T-shirt was the right size and handed over the money, she got into conversation with Angie about places they should visit on the island. The volcano and the Old Colonial Cemetery seemed to be high on the list, but there was somewhere else too…

"Well, of course," said Angie, "you must know that Prince Larry and his wife just moved on to the island."

"Prince Who?" asked Akira.

Amanome rolled his eyes. "The Duke of Richmond, Akira. The British royal who had to move out here with his wife after that scandal that was in all the papers and on TV. You have heard of newspapers and TV, haven't you?"

"The news doesn't have enough punching in it to interest me," shrugged Akira.

"It was all over the internet too," said Kaoru. "Greta Thunberg said on Twitter that the kiwi fruit incident made her despair for the future of the human race."

"Oh, yes," said Angie. "They're living in the Villa Victoria right on Turtle Bay just now. But if you try to get anywhere near it – uh, uh, uh! There are high walls and loads of armed guards! I've been there, but only because Princess Tootsie Frootsie is my cousin!"

"Princess WHAT!?" said Akira. Who would give their kid a name that sounded like a brand of sweets?

"No way!" said Kaoru. "Did you go to the royal wedding?"

Proudly, Angie pulled out a rather battered looking photo showing her, a girl in a hugely-elaborate white wedding dress and several other people who looked like relatives standing in front of a large Gothic church. "Of course! Here we all are outside St George's Chapel in Windsor."

Akira couldn't see much point to all this. His interest in the British Royal Family was exactly zero. Anyway, if this Villa Victoria was heavily-guarded it probably wasn't even a tourist destination.

Besides, he sensed that if Angie were given the chance, she would natter about her royal connections all day. It was time to make a fast getaway. He gazed through the glass panels that made up the front of the airport towards the sun-baked car park and road outside. Beyond them lay an untidy green mass of jungle, and off in the distance, the gently smoking cone of the volcano at the centre of the island.

"Guys," he said. "I think our bus is coming!"

Amanome, who'd known Akira long enough to realise what was going on, grabbed the handle of his suitcase, "He's right. We'd better hurry, everyone! Bye, Angie, see you later!"

They ran for it.

On the third day of their holiday, the three tourists were lying on sun-loungers beside the chlorinated blue oblong of the hotel pool. On the tables next to the loungers stood tall glasses, filled with drinks of such unnatural hues that H.P. Lovecraft could have written stories about them. The hotel was a big white old house, a converted colonial mansion that had been built for some British guy who came to Aloaroamatoa in the days of the Empire to try and get rich by starting a guano processing industry.

Unlike the seagulls, the industry never took off and he'd lost all his money. Still, thought Akira, at least his portrait in the lobby sported a properly manly handlebar moustache. And it was a better hotel that this backwater deserved. The only other foreign guests were a few American old-timers and a Russian "businessman" from Vladivostok with a gold tooth and some very home-made tattoos. It turned out he'd met a couple of the Amenome crew professionally.

Kaoru threw aside a copy of _Occult Monthly_ she'd been pretending to read, with an exasperated gesture.

"Well, are we just going to lie on these loungers and cook ourselves all day?" she asked.

"Yeah, that was pretty much my plan," said Amanome.

"It's really boring just doing nothing," grumbled Kaoru. "Besides, I can't risk getting a tan. You can't be Gothic Lolita with a tan and, besides, my fans would go nuts. They all want Momo Kuruse to be pale and spooky-looking."

"The problem is, Kaoru, I think we've probably done most of what there is to do on the island," replied Akira. "I mean, there's a main town, a jungle and a volcano, and we've visited all of them over the past two days."

Hiking through the rainforest with a guide for a day had been kind of interesting, but the shops in Fort Frederick, the capital, made Angie's Souvenir Stall look like a gadget shop in Akihabara. As for the volcano, their tour of its steaming vents and bubbling mud pools had been overshadowed by awkwardness. The guide spent a suspicious amount of time emphasising that the days when the inhabitants used to regularly throw whoever drew the short straw in there as sacrifices to Atua were **very definitely over**.

"We haven't been to the Old Colonial Cemetery yet," said Kaoru, cheerfully. "Now that's got to be a good place for ghost hunting after dark."

Amanome sat up from his lounger. "OK, before this goes any further, I want to make one thing clear – you can count me out of that."

Akira sighed. This was really all his fault in the first place for mentioning that there had to be spirits somewhere on the island. Sure, it kept Kaoru happy, but it made it inevitable she'd try to find them.

Kaoru shrugged. "Hey, I can go to the Cemetery on my own if you two aren't interested. It's no big deal."

"Tch – don't say that!" snapped Akira. "We all know that if you go there something weird is bound to happen. And I couldn't face myself if you were there on your own and got into trouble. The bottom line is – if you're going, I go too."

"Then it's settled," said Kaoru. "How would midnight suit you?"

"It'll probably be closed and locked up by then."

"I don't think so." Kaoru held up her phone, showing him a picture of the Cemetery on its screen. The wall around it looked about three feet high at most. "A five year old could get in there any time of day or night, no problem."

"So – midnight it is then," said Akira.

Kaoru sprang to her feet and walked off quickly. "See you later, guys, I packed some ghost-hunting equipment and I need to check it before we use it."

She disappeared into the hotel. Akira and Amenome sprawled on their loungers in silence for a moment.

"You know, you're getting very protective towards her, Akira," said Amenome. He took a swig of his cocktail. "She'll appreciate that – it shows you're good boyfriend material. Good work."

"Kaoru is not my girlfriend!" snapped Akira. "She just gets…over-enthusiastic about occult things. She needs someone to keep an eye on her, that's all."

Amenome shrugged. "You keep telling yourself that…honestly, though, it suits my plans. I need someone to keep her occupied this evening."

Akira sat up, and turned to face his friend. "Why? Are you going to hook up with that Russian guy, drink all the vodka you can and then hit on girls at the nearest strip club?"

Amenome raised an eyebrow. "Frankly, I'm disappointed in you. You'll never impress a classy lady like Kaoru with such Neanderthal attitudes towards women. Anyway, it's got nothing to do with Boris _Bad-_unov. I want to be free so I can break into the Villa Victoria and liberate some property from those over-privileged Limeys. I think Kaoru might object to straight-up criminal activity in her vicinity."

Akira shook his head. "What? Burglary? Are you nuts? You heard what that white-haired chick said, that place is guarded like Fort Knox! And if you get past the guards and security cameras, what will you steal? You don't think Prince Larry keeps the Crown Jewels lying around, do you? If he has anything like that, it'll be in a safe, or a bank vault somewhere. Are you going to pinch his TV or something?"

"Once again, my two-fisted crony, you've missed the point. I don't want his stuff, I want his secrets. Larry Boy's just disgraced himself in a big scandal. I mean, Donald Trump said on Twitter that the kiwi fruit incident made him fear for the safety of the Free World. He's bound to keep some compromising info on himself – or someone else. And he probably keeps it close to himself. Just what the Prince of Threats should be looking for!"

"Yeah, well you're not the Prince of…Stealing Things, or whatever, are you? How come you're so confident about being able to do it without my help?"

Amanome grinned. "Oh, noes! Is an old friendship being put to the test when one friend has to choose between his friend and his crush? Find out in next week's exciting episode of _Kijima, God of Romance_!"

"Hey, stop being such a smartass! And she is not my crush!"

"Oh, keep your hair on… firstly, your idea of stealth is roundhouse kicking someone in the head, so you're not exactly a cat-burglar yourself. Secondly, you _will _be helping." He pulled out his phone and brought up an aerial map of the island on Google Maps. His finger stabbed at the screen. "As you can see, the Old Colonial Cemetery is right next to the Villa Victoria. And a couple of ghost hunters crashing around there in the middle of the night is just what I need to distract Prince Larry's security team. You and Kaoru are my diversion – I'll need it about 12.30 or so, if you don't mind."

"Oh, brother!" muttered Akira.

The Old Colonial Cemetery turned out to be out on a peninsula projecting out to the north of Turtle Bay. You had to get off the road, which wasn't lit itself at that point, follow a path through a patch of jungle and then cross some open ground to get to it, and, needless to say, at midnight it was dark in a way that city dwellers don't often get to see.

Akira and Kaoru were carrying torches with red cellophane wrapped around the front end, so as not to ruin their night vision or attract quite so much attention. Unfortunately, the resulting dull red glow wasn't so great at actually lighting the way. As they pushed through the trees, they kept stumbling over fallen branches and twisted roots and into hanging vines. Every so often, they'd be startled as a giant shadow appeared suddenly in the torchlight, then realise it was only a moth attracted to the light.

There was a constant background chorus of weird noises, croaks and whistles from frogs and night birds that Akira didn't recognise. It put him on edge. Behind the animal sounds, you could hear the waves crashing on the rocks of the Bay.

"Ugh, I can't believe how close and sticky it is!" whispered Kaoru, with disgust. The air was like that in a small bathroom containing the world's hottest bath.

"Just as well you aren't wearing one of the Gothic Lolita outfits," replied Akira. Kaoru opened her mouth to respond, but as she did so, she tripped over another branch, and would have fallen flat on her face if Akira hadn't reached out and caught her as quick as a flash.

She leaned against his shoulders for a moment, supported in his muscular arms, and murmured softly in his ear – "Hey, Akira, I don't want to be rude, but please make sure you have a shower when we get back to the hotel."

"Yeah, I know," he replied. "To be honest, I think you'll need one too. You smell like most of my opponents do at the end of a bout."

Kaoru righted herself. "Oh, well, I suppose it can't be helped."

When they reached the low enclosure of the Cemetery, they quickly found that, in fact, the gate wasn't even locked. Inside the wall, rows of headstones stretched off into the darkness. The standard grey or black oblong stones were interspersed with taller monuments in white marble and one or two brick family vaults. In the distance, Akira could see a large house outlined against the lighter sky. High walls surrounded it and there were one or two lights still on in the windows. It must be the Villa Victoria.

Kaoru had shone her torch on one of the headstones and was gazing at it.

"Can you read what it says?" asked Akira. Kaoru spoke English better than he did.

"Well, it belongs to a Major Gerald Brown and Mrs Brown who died here in 1882. I think their death must have been horribly violent, because it says "Rip" in big letters underneath."

"My God, these Westerners are savage!" muttered Akira. "Better" is a relative term. Kaoru pulled off her backpack and produced from it an oblong black plastic object with various lights and buttons on it.

"It's an EMF meter," she explained. "We can use it to detect changes in the electro-magnetic field caused by the presence of ghosts and spirits."

"What's the electro-magnetic field? And why does the presence of ghosts change it?" asked Akira.

"Well…I dunno, to be honest, but apparently all the best ghost-hunters have one of these things. It flashes green when something's happening and red when…it isn't."

"Oh, well, I've brought the tape recorder, so all we need to do is find a good spot to wait."

After a certain amount of faffing around and checking the EMF meter, Kaoru decided that the most likely spot for something to happen was a space in front of one of the family vaults. The building had steps which provided a convenient spot for them to sit. Akira pondered how on earth he was going to use the circumstances he found himself in to create a distraction for Amanome…

He was still pondering about half an hour later, when the EMF meter started flashing green and Kaoru jumped to her feet. "It's happening!" she hissed. "Turn on the tape recorder!"

Akira clicked the "On" button.

"I can't see anything, though!" he whispered back.

"It might not be a physical manifestation, though. That's why we need the tape…Oh, my God!"

A large black shape detached itself from the shadows around a nearby tomb, and began to move towards them, with a shambling, zombie-like gait. It was about the size and shape of a large, heavy-set human, but as it came, it began to emit a low, moaning sound with an eerie, unearthly quality to it.

"Nooooo….nooooo….oh nooooo!" moaned the shape. "What a terrible fate!" Akira held up the tape recorder so it would catch the noise properly, while Kaoru clasped her hands together in glee. "Nooooo!" moaned the shape, as it continued to advance. Then, before it could reach them, it stumbled on a tussock of grass, lost its footing and stumbled into a newly-dug grave in which a coffin had clearly been placed earlier that same day. A spade had been left thrust into the soil, and with a terrible clatter, and a very human yell, the shape knocked the spade and a whole heap of wreaths, bunches of flowers and soft toys into the hole on top of the coffin, then fell after it.

Akira jumped up and ran over to the grave, with Kaoru on his heels. At the same time, lights flashed on in the Villa Victoria, and they heard a loud voice, crying "Oi! What's going on over there!", quickly followed by sound of feet crunching over gravel. The noise had clearly aroused the interest of Prince Larry's security detail.

By the time Akira reached the grave, the man who had fallen in it had rolled over on his back on top of the coffin, where he lay cursing. Shining his torch into the hole, he immediately recognised the face of Ban Naomasa.

"What the…? Urgh, help me up!" moaned Ban. He smelt strongly of alcohol.

"OI!" yelled the guard's voice, now closer at hand.

Akira extended a hand to his old journalist friend. "Kaoru!" he called out. "Forget ghosts, we'll have to run for it!"

They did. Again.

Akira finally came to a halt on the edge of the road where they had started, panting heavily and totally exhausted. Fortunately, Prince Larry wasn't getting his expenses covered from state funds now and his bodyguards were not the most efficient squad of close protection operatives ever. They couldn't keep up with Akira at full pelt, or even Kaoru and Ban.

Kaoru collapsed to her knees as soon as she stopped running, and as for Ban, standing next to her, he was doubled over and gasping for breath.

"Hey…old man…you need to stop smoking and drinking so much…maybe hit the gym as well," Akira managed to get out between breaths.

"Wiseass punk!" growled Ban, then stopped to gasp a bit more. Once he had finally caught his breath he went on. "What the hell were you two doing in there?"

"Hey, I could ask you the same, Ban. I was helping Kaoru do some ghost-hunting. You?"

Ban shrugged. "I'm a reporter. I go where the story is, and there's no bigger story than Prince Larry and that wife of his just now. Did you know that Ash Ketchum said on Twitter that the kiwi fruit incident made him want to give up training Pokemon? I was hoping I could get a scoop out of what's going on at the Villa Victoria. I've been watching the place for a few days."

"Sounds like stalking to me. Anyway, what was all that groaning and moaning about?"

"Things got…a bit out of hand yesterday. I was getting bored keeping the villa under surveillance, so I went to this bar in Fort Frederick. It turned out there was a Russian guy there who operates a poker game for locals in the back room. I dropped nearly three hundred thousand yen on it. I swear he played crooked – it's infuriating! That was almost all the money I had on me."

"Russian guy? Did he have a gold tooth on one side and various prison tattoos?"

"Yes, as a matter of fact."

"I might have guessed! It's a Mafiya guy staying at our hotel and he definitely ripped you off. You need to stop gambling, old man!"

"Well, anyway, I drank away most of what was left, and when you saw me I had just woken up. With a bad hangover. Now do you understand the moaning? With all the money I've lost chasing this story, I need to find something big fast."

Kaoru slowly got to her feet and returned the EMF meter to her backpack. She looked disappointed at the failure of her ghost hunt to produce any spooky results.

"Oh, well, better luck next time," said Akira. "We should head back to the hotel."

"Do you mind if I crash with you?" asked Ban. "I can't afford a hotel room now."

Akira sighed. He knew Ban would wind up with him, too. Amanome would never agree to share and it wouldn't be right to put him in with Kaoru. "There's a couch in my room you can sleep on," he said, finally. "I just hope you don't snore."

They started to walk back down the side of the road, in the general direction of the hotel.

"So, did you notice much happening at the Villa Victoria?" asked Kaoru.

"I noticed crates of empty bottles going in," said Ban. "At first I thought my story might be "Exiled prince sinks into alcoholism," but then I realised they were going in, but not coming out. That's pretty weird."

"That…doesn't sound very exciting though," said Akira.

"Jeez, everyone's a critic nowadays," harrumphed Ban. "Listen, kiddo, you get to have an opinion on what's an exciting newspaper story once you learn to read one, OK?"

"I mean, you could always sleep outside under one of the palm trees, if you like…" said Akira.

Kaoru enforced a "no talking" rule all the way back to the hotel.

When they got back, Amanome had already put up the "Do Not Disturb" sign outside his room, so they didn't get to see him until breakfast the next morning in the restaurant. He looked distinctly glum, but waited until Kaoru had finished her miso soup and rice and wandered off from the table to the pool before filling them in.

"Thanks for the distraction, Akira, but…" He grimaced. "In the end it didn't help. You did a great job of getting those idiot guards' attention, but either His Royal Highness is more careful than I thought, or he really hasn't got any compromising information in his house. I found a blind spot in the cameras, picked a lock and got inside but…no luck. Mind you, I couldn't stay all that long."

Akira shrugged. "Well, I warned you that might happen."

"Wait…hold on!" said Ban. "You were inside the Villa Victoria? What the hell were you doing? And what did you see?"

"Keep your voice down, Ban!" hissed Amanome. "This is a public place! Akira and I owe some people a lot of money – family business. I was hoping for a quick score. But it turns out that there's nothing in that house but fancy furniture and high-end electronic gadgets. Worth money, of course, but not really enough for us right now, and too heavy for me to get out on my own. The guy didn't even leave his cuff-links lying about." He sighed. "I'll tell you one thing though – there were cabinets full of whisky. Bottles and bottles of it, but not even the really expensive single malts. Just blended malts, like, famous brand-names, but nothing really special. Either he or his wife are drunks, and tightwads as well!"

"Woah, woah, woah!" said Ban. "Prince Larry's house is full of blended whiskies? Did you take photos?"

"Hey, what did I tell you about keeping your voice down!" snapped Amanome. "But, actually, yeah, I did take some shots with my camera, so I got the layout of the place, just in case I got the chance to go back in there."

Ban, too excited to notice the first part of what Amanome was saying, pulled out a notebook from his pocket and stared down at something written in it. He shook his head in disbelief. Amanome and Akira glanced at each other, perplexed. At last, Ban spoke in a low voice:-

"OK, you guys, I think I have the solution to your money problems. And it's in the Villa Victoria, although it isn't what Amanome-san was looking for."

"Ban, what the hell are you talking about?" asked Akira.

"I'll explain later," said Ban. "But before I can pull this off, I need something from you – a promise. I have my own money troubles. Amanome-san, I need your word of honour as a yakuza that, if you make money out of this, at least a million yen of it will come to me."

Amanome shrugged. "Well, I'm not technically a member yet, so I don't know why you think my word of honour is worth much. And besides, why should I promise you a million yen when I don't know what I'm going to get out of the deal, or how I'm going to get it? I'm already deep in debt as it is."

"I know your old man well enough to know that he'll hold you to your word, whether you're a member or not. And if this works, you'll be out of debt. If it doesn't, then you don't owe me the million."

"Fine, fine," sighed Amanome. "I promise on my honour that if we make more than a million yen out of whatever your crazy scheme is, you'll get a million. Now would you kindly please explain your scheme to us?"

"Well, it'll involve having a little chat with Prince Larry," said Ban. "And a bit of additional investigation."

You could say what you liked about Ban, but he did have the qualities of a good reporter, among which are a persuasive telephone manner and plenty of determination. It took a series of phone calls to various people, not to mention a couple of mysterious and unexplained excursions, but the following day he and Amanome, under the guise of Hajime Hirawata, veteran foreign correspondent of the Tokyo Times, and his assistant, were on their way by taxi to the Villa Victoria.

"Don't you need me with you, for protection?" asked Akira, when he was told.

"I don't think so, my hot-blooded amigo," said Amanome. "This is a delicate matter to be tackled with suave diplomacy, not a street brawl. You just don't speak the same language as these people, and that's not a metaphor."

"Besides, it looks weird enough to have a newspaper reporter turn up with one assistant, let alone two," added Ban.

"Hey, don't blame me if this all goes wrong and you get roughed up by those goons of his," said Akira.

"That won't happen," said Amanome, with breezy self-assurance. "Just you take your sweetheart on her little excursion." Kaoru had opted to go on a guided tour of the distillery. She had heard they provided free samples at the end.

"She is not my sweetheart!"

"Whatever you say, lover boy. It's not as if even you could take on all of the Prince's bodyguards on your own anyway."

When they reached the gate of the villa, Ban and Amanome were met by a tall, distinguished man calling himself Captain Wilkinson, who explained he was the Prince's private secretary and led them past the glowering gorillas on duty to the drawing room. As Amanome had said, it was furnished with heavy and expensive-looking furniture, mostly in dark wood, and the pair sat on one of the sofas.

Someone had done their best to make the garden which the drawing room's French windows opened on to the kind of English country garden that you can buy books about at the gift shops of National Trust properties, but with lush clumps of ferns and parakeets squawking as they shot around the palm trees like green bullets, it hadn't quite worked.

The Duke, as Captain Wilkinson persistently referred to him, turned out to be a grey-haired, pot-bellied man in his fifties, wearing the signature white leisure suit that he had, miraculously, managed to bring back in style, or at least out of fashion Siberia. It actually suited the South Pacific a lot better than London.

Princess Tootsie-Frootsie, who shared her cousin's brown skin and white hair, fluttered vaguely about in the background making welcoming noises and directing a maid who provided everyone with tea and biscuits. Eventually, her husband politely suggested that they needed to get on with the interview and the Princess and maid disappeared behind the scenes like figures on a cuckoo clock after it's struck the hour.

"So, Mr Hirawata, what were you wanting to ask me about?" said Prince Larry.

"I think I'd better make clear up-front that we aren't commenting any further on the kiwi fruit incident," added Captain Wilkinson.

"Well, sir, it's not so much a question as a statement," said Ban, whose English was excellent. "And the statement is – we want you to pay us money."

"Excuse me?" said Prince Larry.

"Is this some kind of joke?" said Captain Wilkinson. "Because if it is, this interview is over and I'm calling security to escort you out!"

Ban grinned wolfishly. "No, it isn't a joke. And I don't think you'll have us thrown out, either. Sir, I think you and the Captain need to look at these." He held out his phone, and as the two Englishmen gazed at the screen in icy silence, he brought up a series of images – of empty bottles labelled "Blood of Aloaroamatoa" standing in the courtyard of the villa, of cabinets with shelves lined with full bottles labelled "Bell's", "Teacher's" and "Johnnie Walker", and of a couple of printed and signed statements.

"Those statements are from delivery drivers, who remember making multiple deliveries of empty bottles here and also picking up crates of what appeared to be very much full bottles of whisky to be dropped at the distillery. It didn't take much money to get them talking. Incidentally, I've got copies of all this stuff somewhere you probably won't find them, so don't even think of having your men take the phone."

"Damnit!" spat out Prince Larry. "How much do you know?"

"Well, we know that you've been part of a scheme to pass off cheaper blended whisky as "Blood of Aloaroamatoa", a rare single malt that sells at a much higher price to collectors," said Amanome. "And I think that's enough."

"Now look here," said Captain Wilkinson. "None of this is illegal. Those bottles all had some of the genuine article mixed in. Adding the blended whisky was just a way of…making it go further. And there's no legal definition of what is or isn't a single malt on this island."

"Captain, you know very well that the tabloid press back home won't care about the details of the law on Aloaroamatoa. How on earth did a member of the Royal Family get mixed up in such a fifth-rate con?" asked Ban.

Prince Larry sighed. "I know some of the directors of the distillery. They were under financial pressure. So was I. They wanted someone unconnected to the distillery to import a load of cheap Scotch. It's a small island, so there aren't many people without some kind of connection - that's why I thought those drivers wouldn't get too interested. So I said I could help them with that. After all, no-one looks too closely into what a Prince is bringing through customs. They also wanted somewhere off their premises to do the mixing, and the villa's got a big cellar."

"I would have thought it was your job to stop your employer doing something so foolish, Captain," said Ban.

Wilkinson shrugged. "It's also my job to ensure I have a job. We don't get official funding any more, and when your employer blows a small fortune on a back-room game of poker in a bar with some Russian…"

"Oh no!" said Amanome. "He wasn't a guy with tattoos and a gold tooth by any chance?"

"Yes, he was, actually," said the Prince. "I really took a bath on that game! Look, let's not mess around - what do you want to make this all go away?"

"14 million yen," said Ban. "We thought it would be an easy sum of money for you to get hold of. Perhaps I was being optimistic."

Prince Larry smiled grimly. "Oh, no, I'm not quite that broke yet. You might have a problem getting all those bank notes out of the country without attracting attention from the bank or airport security, though."

Ban glanced over at Amanome. "Do you know of any off-shore accounts we can have it wired to?" he asked, in Japanese. "Any bank account in Japan will trace straight to one of us."

"That could be tricky," replied Amanome. "All the ones I know about are controlled by front men for some of our members. If they find out, the family will take every penny."

There was a short silence. It seemed as if the two men's scheme was about to run up against a brick wall. Then, Amanome smiled.

"Your Royal Highness," he asked, "what kind of watches do you own?"

Kaoru hummed "Wander Rabbits" to herself as the three of them, plus Ban, who had managed to get himself booked on to the same flight, hauled their suitcases across the airport concourse again. Akira wondered if it wasn't somehow in bad taste for Kaoru to hum her own hit (well, Momo Kuruse's) in public, but he didn't say anything.

The three men's suitcases were made a little heavier by the weight of several Rolexes and other expensive watches given to them by Prince Larry, by way of a pay off. Ban and Amanome had concluded that even the most zealous security guard was unlikely to care too much about tourists carrying a few fancy-looking timepieces.

There had been some tense negotiations around whether the watches were worth what Prince Larry said they were, and what they would sell for. In the end, Ban had to make a side trip to the island's only jeweller to get a valuation done, before they decided it was safe to accept. It meant Ban would get his million yen and Amanome and Akira could pay off their debts and split whatever was left, maybe another million. The holiday had paid for itself and more, even after Kaoru insisted on making a farewell visit to Yonaga's Souvenir Stall, much to Angie's delight, to spend her remaining Aloaroamatoan currency on tat.

"Looks like our flight will be boarding in half-an-hour or so," said Akira, nodding towards the departure board. "We'd better hustle!"

"OK!" said Kaoru, cheerfully. "You know, guys, this has been one of the best holidays I've been on!"

"Glad you enjoyed it," said Amanome.

"There is one thing though…Akira, you promised me spirits! And, so far, spirits have played absolutely no part in what we've done!"

Akira glanced at Amanome, who barely suppressed a grin, then back at Kaoru, who was pretending to pout.

"Sorry, Kaoru," said Akira meekly. "We'll see what we can do about that when we get back to Japan."

"Like I said," muttered Amanome, "good boyfriend material."


End file.
